ICE “Not Ready for Prime Time” in Cyberspace

Guitarist Jordon Dodson exploring the diverse sonorities in Maurizio Azzan’s music (screen shot from the video being discussed)

This afternoon I had my first streamed encounter with the International Contemporary Ensemble (ICE) through its TUES@7 series. The program was based on the Radical Pairings initiative presented as part of the Music at the Anthology (MATA) mission to present, support, and commission the music of early career composers. The idea behind the pairing involves the contrast of differences, rather than shared approaches or beliefs.

Those contrasts could not have been more evident. Guitarist Jordan Dodson played four movements from Maurizio Azzan’s “ongoing” guitar suite Geometrie nelle mani (geometries in the hands), while the two compositions by Yvette Janine Jackson were written for percussion performed by Colleen Bernstein. Both composers had world premiere offerings, composed under MATA commissions. Azzan’s was the sixth movement of his suite, and Dodson preceded it with the suite’s first three movements. Jackson’s premiering vibraphone solo, “I’ve Ever Seen,” concluded the program, which began with her 2019 composition for drum kit, “Deliberate (Afraid of Nothing).”

Taken as a whole, this was a program of inventive sonorities. Azzan was particularly innovative in exploring an impressive spectrum of guitar techniques involving plucking, strumming, and knocking the instrument’s body. Jackson seemed more focused on sonorities in isolation or, in the case of “Deliberate (Afraid of Nothing),” in contrast to electronically synthesized sounds. From a subjective point of view, Azzan was more skilled at both establishing and then sustaining the attention of the listener; but there was definitely no shortage of innovation during the roughly 35 minutes of performance.

The good news is that the recording has been uploaded to YouTube for subsequent listening. Note that I did not also write “viewing.” The production skills behind the making of this video were frustratingly lacking, as was the supplementary material made available to the viewer. Most agonizing was the attempt to overlay the text information about each selection over a background with such poor contrast as to make that information all but unreadable. Just as frustrating, however, was the hyperlink to a PDF of program notes, which went on a great length to discussed Azzan’s suite while saying absolutely nothing about Jackson’s contributions.

The over all result made the whole viewing experience feel like a hey-kids-let’s-put-on-a-show offering. Considering how many examples I have now encountered to use streamed video to compensate for closed concert halls, I fear that ICE has firmly staked out its position at the bottom of the list. Emerging young composers, who seem to be the bread-and-butter of ICE productions, definitely deserve better.